


Hopeless

by Gamemakers



Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types, Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Cute Irish Guy, Domestic Violence, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, F/M, Far Too Much Cursing, General Carousing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-26
Updated: 2016-06-08
Packaged: 2018-05-29 07:42:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 17,821
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6365284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gamemakers/pseuds/Gamemakers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Senior year is supposed to be a breeze, but the second she sees his name, Annie knows this isn't going to be easy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

"Jo. Jo, come over here."

"The fuck, Cresta? If this is another goddamn spider, I'm going to –"

"It's him. He's here." Her voice quivered, and Annie knew she couldn't be making much sense, but no, this wasn't supposed to be happening. There were what, six, seven billion people on the planet? And out of all of them, it just had to be him. No, please, she couldn't handle this right now. Or ever, for that matter. She supposed it had to happen sometime, but today? Oh God, she wanted to cry. _Keep it together, Annie._

Johanna squinted against the blue light of her laptop. "Who are you – oh. Fuck."

"Yeah."

"Show me your arm." Instead of waiting for Annie to move, she grabbed her arm and pushed up the sleeve. In the darkness, it was impossible to make anything out, and Johanna swore as she reached for the light switch, pulling Annie along with her.

"I did check that they matched, you know."

Johanna studied the two names. "Looks like you're screwed, Cresta."

She had already started to come to terms with the fact that her greatest enemy would be in charge of her for the next sixteen weeks. Not much she could do, after all. "Maybe it's just a guy with the same name. It doesn't necessarily have to be him." Or maybe it would just be a rough few weeks and afterwards she would carry on with a wonderfully charmed life. She didn't know what she could do to attract a really bad worst enemy. He'd probably be only unpleasant. Fantastic.

"Yeah, I'm sure there are a bunch of Finnick Odairs running around."

"You could at least let me hope."

"And get your hopes up? Nah, I'd rather have you cry now than later." Johanna flopped back down onto her bed. "Get some sleep, Cresta. Being sleep-deprived isn't going to help anything."

Annie tried to rub away the goosebumps that had appeared on her arms and legs. "Aren't you a nice, supportive friend."

She snorted. "The hell do you think I am? If you thought I was going to be sunshine and rainbows about this, you've got bigger problems than I thought."

"Just go back to sleep."

Johanna grinned at her, her expression pure mischief. "One more thing."

"Fine. Don't make me regret it."

"Wow, I'm so glad you're giving me permission. It's not like I would have said whatever I wanted to anyway." Annie wanted to wipe that stupid grin off her friend's face. Couldn't she see that this was a crisis? "If you're going to fight him, don't fuck up that face. It's a national treasure." When the pillow struck her face, she burst out laughing.

* * *

Okay, Jo had a point there. No TA had any business being that good-looking. That he managed to look cute in the little thumbnail picture the college attached to all their emails should have been her first clue. Annie's picture looked like a child who had just realized she was about to be devoured – an accurate description of how she had felt on her first day as a freshman. In fact, she couldn't think of anyone whose photo looked more than halfway decent.

Add the looks to that slight hint of an accent – English? Australian? Maybe Irish? she really ought to be better at picking out the difference between those – and she had one heck of a semester in store for her. Okay, not really, since she had the form to switch recitation sections waiting in her backpack, but she could always forget about it. _Remember he's your worst enemy, and this section won't seem nearly as appealing._ Good to know her own mind was a pretty okay source for wisdom and advice. She should really listen to herself more often.

"Annette Cresta?" She jumped at the sound of her name. Oh no, he'd realized who she was, God have mercy, please sweet baby Jesus –

Oh wait, calling attendance was a thing. Not a cool thing, because it meant she would have to show up to class, but way better than him knowing that he would be her worst enemy. "Here," she squeaked in a terrible attempt at keeping her voice even. A couple of her classmates glanced over at her, concerned, and she avoided looking at them by almost burying her face in the syllabus. As much as she wanted to – this was her last class in her major, and Annie refused to mess up her grade point at this stage- she couldn't focus on the words in front of her. Did he know? These relationships, both good and bad, weren't always reciprocal, after all. Finnick could easily have a way worse enemy. Annie couldn't really be that bad, could she? If she could just remember to wear shirts with sleeves every day, there was no reason he would ever have to know. Yeah, she could get through this just fine. Wait, what was he wearing?

Annie lowered her syllabus to sneak another peek at him. Nope, long sleeves. No luck there.

"I think you all can handle reading over the syllabus yourselves, right?" He waited for a second but received no reply. "Seems like we're going to have to work on this yes-no question thing." He chuckled at his own joke, and she wasn't sure if that was endearingly dorky or a sign of the evil dwelling inside him. "All right, if nobody has any questions, I don't have any reason to keep you. Have a nice day, everyone. I'll see you in lecture on Thursday."

She wasn't going to ask for another excuse to get the hell out of here. Annie crammed her stuff into her book bag in a way that would make her cringe any other day. Even now, thinking about all those wrinkled papers made her anxiety creep up a little. She pushed those thoughts away as she hurried out, trying not to think about how Finnick's eyes followed her every step of the way.


	2. Chapter 2

The next time, she would come armed with research. There were more Facebook profiles for Finnick Odairs than she would have expected. Luckily, it hadn't been hard to narrow it down to the correct one. Just find the one with a profile pic that wouldn't look out of place on a male version of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition and go from there. Okay, she had paused for a second or two for admiration purposes first, but whatever.

He hadn't bothered to change his location from Dingle Town (she still couldn't get over that name, oh gosh), Ireland. That explained the accent, at least. Pictures located in the States started about two years ago, and considering that his profile put him at twenty-four, that seemed about right for the start of grad school. She scrolled down a bit further. A girl a couple years younger with him that shared his bronze hair, a fifty-something woman with his green eyes, him smiling with friends at what looked like the most stereotypical Irish pub she could dream up… all of it was so normal. Maybe it had been juvenile, but she had always imagined her worst enemy would come clearly labeled as a bad guy, mustache-twirling and all.

Wow, he should really make more of his profile private if he didn't want people Facebook-stalking him. Either this guy posted a lot (or, at least, had posted a lot a few years ago, since they had definitely slowed down in the last year or two), or he had no privacy filters on. Oh well. Annie knew better than to complain about something that made her life a whole heck of a lot easier.

"Are you really on there again?" She snapped her laptop closed at the sound of Johanna's voice. "God, Cresta, I'm going to start thinking you're crushing on him if you keep doing that. Every time I come into this room –"

"Shut up. I am not!"

"Wanna show me what you were looking at, then?"

Annie glared at her. "I want to know what I'm going up against. Is that an issue?"

"Y'know, yeah, it is. It bugs the hell out of me that you're acting like this guy is your mortal enemy when what you really want is to jump his bones." When Annie tried to protest, Johanna raised a finger to silence her. "Make all the excuses you want, but if you were honestly afraid of him, you'd be going to the counselor's office to the get the fuck out of his section, not looking for more pictures of him."

Why hadn't she gone for that RA position? It'd be a good life experience to put on her resumé, she wouldn't have to pay rent, and most importantly, there'd be no stupid roommates to deal with. "Shut it, Jo," she warned. Because Lord help her, if that woman didn't cut it out –

Yeah, because threats totally worked on Johanna. "Don't get pissy at me. I'm just trying to make sure you know what you're doing."

"And you're being very superior while you do it. Why don't you tell me what you'd do in my situation, since you obviously know exactly what to do?" She thought about bowing at the end of that, but Annie was smart enough to know when she was in hot water, and as tempting as it sounded, she didn't really want to start a physical fight with Johanna. True, Annie had a good fifteen pounds on the other woman, but there was no way she would win that fight.

She rolled her eyes, and Annie's blood boiled. "You'll just yell at me."

"No, now I really want to know." If she was going to tease Annie for doing her best, the least she could do was offer suggestions. Instead, the woman grabbed her keys from where she'd set them down and started to open the door. "Jo!"

"Fine." Johanna shut the door, but Annie couldn't help but notice that she didn't put her keys back down. "If you really want to know what I would do in your situation, I would get out of that class. No matter what the outcome here is, mixing feelings with school is going to get messy. Then, I would think long and hard about whether you're as certain about Alec as you'd like to be or not."

She had been doing her best to ignore that possibility. "You think I have the two names confused?"

Johanna shrugged. "I'm sure it's not the first time that's happened. God or whoever else decided we should have dumb tattoos that tell us who we love and who we hate probably likes to fuck with people."

"True." It was hard to argue with that one. Two names stamped in neat, block-print black letters adorned almost everybody's arm. A certain segment of the population had one or none. Mothers everywhere stayed up at night worrying what that meant for their child. There was a constant temptation associated with the markings: to look up the other person, to narrow down which was which, to do something, anything, that made fate seem a little less certain and preordained. Most cultures frowned upon such actions. Up to this point, she had done so well, only checking the new telephone books for Odairs and Joneses, but the discipline she had built up over the years all fell apart this weekend. Fan-freaking-tastic.

"Well, what's the other name on Alec's arm?" Luckily for her, Johanna was a bit better at staying on track than she was.

Annie racked her brain. "It was a girl's name. Something with a 'c', maybe?"

"You're kidding me. You've been dating him for six months and don't know what his tattoos say?" A wicked smile played at the edges of her mouth. "Or are you too focused on the other bits?"

It shouldn't bother her, really it shouldn't, but Annie's cheeks reddened anyway. Did she have no control over anything anymore? Never mind, she didn't want to think too hard about that one. "None of your business."

Johanna laughed. Annie's distress usually met with that reaction around here. Lovely. "You're cute, Cresta." From Johanna, it felt more like an insult than a compliment. Funny how those two always ended up topsy-turvy with her.

"I am not!" Oh god, she was actually arguing about this? Time to disengage before things got really out of control. "Never mind, I've got shit to do."

"Dropping that class?"

"Something like that."

* * *

Bad idea. Really bad idea. Annie held her breath, counted to ten, checked that she had her pepper spray, then did the whole thing again because why not, before finally knocking. "Come in. It's open."

The doors in Younker all squeaked. Probably problems with the foundation that nobody had bothered to address in the last hundred and fifty years. She couldn't blame them. If she could just sit on her problems for the next century or so, wait them out until she died and they became somebody else's business, Annie would totally go for it.

The cramped room held four desks, each covered in books and papers and the other mess that came with graduate work. The room's only occupant sat at the desk against the far wall, not that far really meant much in the cramped graduate offices. That was probably for the best. She had ran through the situation more times than she cared to admit, but that didn't mean she was ready to act it out for an audience. Finnick smiled and stood up. "Hi, it's Annette, right?"

"Annie, thanks." She shook his hand. Warm, a bit calloused, no wedding ring or pale band where one would be. She tucked those observations away for later. Annie had watched way too many crime shows over the years to not take note of the seemingly-minor details.

"Hi, Annie. I thought you might be coming in sometime. Let me find you a chair, um… I don't think Cashmere'll mind." He removed a stack of books off of the chair at the desk next to him and set it in front of his desk. "Please."

She sat down, keeping her head held high and back rigidly straight. He had been expecting her. Worry curled deep in her stomach, but she couldn't leave now. Commitment sucked. "What did you want to talk about?" she asked, careful not to reveal too much.

"Usually, I'd say that you came to see me, but I think I know." Finnick pushed his sleeve up to his shoulder. "Is it safe to assume this is what you came here to talk about?" He turned so she could make out the names tattooed across his bicep. Oh, it even listed her as Annie. That was a nice touch. And the other? Coriolanus – oh dear, she had no idea how to pronounce that name – Snow. Sounded male, and though Annie was certainly willing to admit she could be wrong on this point, male didn't quite seem Finnick's type.

She realized he was waiting for her to respond. "Yeah, that's it."

"Well, I'm glad for that, at least. I'd be a little worried if you didn't know what I was talking about." He had a nice smile. Definite point in his favor there. "I assume you'll be switching discussion sections?"

"I have all the paperwork ready to drop the class."

"Why?"

She frowned. "I don't want you to get in trouble." Yeah, it was totally him she'd been worrying about.

"Mags is brilliant. You want to stay in." Telling her what she wanted already? She was glad she had left her bag on her lap. It made it very easy for her to reach into it and grab her pepper spray. "Sorry, I mean I'd stay in if I were you. She's my adviser, so maybe I'm a little biased, but she's just brilliant. I know she's hard to understand sometimes – she had a stroke last year – but you'll get used to it. It's worth taking her class."

True, from what she'd heard of the second analysis class, knot theory was a breeze in comparison, but… "I'll think about it."

"Well, would you like to think on it over a cup of coffee? If we fill out the paperwork to switch sections, whether you choose to or not, before we get there, I'm sure it doesn't count as chasing after my student."

"And are you planning on chasing after me?" She kept her voice teasing, but the question was serious.

He smiled. "I'm not sure, Annie. Mind helping me figure that one out?"


	3. Chapter 3

"Not much of a coffee drinker?" he asked as the barrista handed her the paper cup filled with cocoa.

Annie sipped a bit of the whipped cream off the top. "Too bitter for me. How 'bout you?"

"It's not my favorite, but let's say that coffee and I have come to appreciate one another. Grad school's hard enough if you can stay awake. I don't want to think about how bad it'd be if I wasn't pretty much always well-caffeinated." He waved to the woman behind the counter. "That one's mine, thanks." Finnick reached over to grab his drink. "Wow, this place is crowded this time of day."

"Yeah, I don't think we're going to find a pace to sit in here. Want to head outside? My friends and I always sit in this spot outside the library. There're never any people there." And it was in clear view of the busy campus center, which certainly didn't hurt. Just because he didn't seem like the spawn of Satan didn't mean she wanted to be alone with him. You never knew with some people.

"Sounds good to me. Need anything before we head?"

"Yeah, wait one sec while I grab a straw."

When she returned, Finnick grinned at her. "So, you're one of those people, huh?"

Hey, if he was her soulmate, he had no right to judge her for ripping off the tops of her straw wrappers and then blowing the bottom half into the garbage. He probably did a ton of geeky stuff too. And if he happened to be her greatest enemy, Annie wasn't inclined to give a shit what he thought about her. Really, looking at it that way was pretty damn liberating. "Yep. It makes my day a little more interesting."

"Doesn't it burn the roof of your mouth to drink hot chocolate with a straw?" He held the door open for her, then waited for a few more people to file into the crowded campus coffee shop before following her out.

"Hot chocolate might be a little bit of a misnomer with this place. Lukewarm chocolate's more like it, but it tastes good." Annie took another sip. It didn't warm her up inside the way a really nice, piping hot drink would, but thank goodness, even January here never got so cold that she really needed anything too hot. "So, tell me about yourself. What kind of a person are you?"

"Hmm… well, first of all, I don't drink hot things with a straw," he laughed. "Let's see. I'm twenty-four years old, I'm Irish, and I moved here almost two years ago now to study maths."

She smiled. "And don't forget, you're one of those people who says maths instead of math."

"Well, is it mathematic or mathematics?" he asked.

"You're the one who decided to come to America." Annie patted his shoulder to brush away any actual offense. "Don't try to use logic on me, Finnick. It's not going to work."

"I'll be sure to make a mental note of it. Oh, this spot. You know, I think I might have seen you sitting out here once or twice. Usually at that second table, right? The one with the yellow umbrella?"

He had noticed her on multiple occasions before she knew him as more than a name. The knot in her stomach returned at that revelation. How long had he been watching her, noting her every move? She faltered for a moment when they came to the steps of the library, but Annie forced herself to keep going. It could be innocent. She'd like to think she was at least somewhat attractive, and maybe he'd just made note of a pretty girl sitting with a few friends. Lord knew she couldn't judge him for that. How many times had she done the exact same thing with some cute guy? Okay, not all that often since she'd started dating Alec, because her ogling other guys bugged the heck out of him, but the point still held.

Oh yeah, they were doing this whole conversation thing. Maybe all this spacing off was why she'd had such a hard time making friends her first semester. "Um, yeah, this is where we usually sit. I don't know why more people don't use these tables. They're nice and warm out in the sun, and that's really nice in the winter, and…" Yeah, time to stop babbling. Sit for a few minutes, thank him for the hot chocolate, then run away as quickly as possible so she could figure out what the hell she was doing. Sounded like a plan.

Except she didn't want to. They kept up their conversation as he wiped up the table – apparently someone else did use the tables out here, because they'd made a complete mess of them – and she found herself more and more drawn into his world. She had been warned about men like this, the spider-like ones who pulled you in closer and closer with their charms until like that poor fly, you were caught in their webs, but she would fall for it all the same. What a fucking idiot. And maybe he wasn't so bad. Yeah, that'd look great on a death certificate. _Cause of death: He didn't seem all that bad at first_. Classic.

* * *

"Come on, pick up." She frowned at the fourth ring, then the fifth. But she wasn't going to hang up without talking to him. Annie didn't care if that meant she had to leave him twenty messages before he bothered to pick up. Unlimited calling had surely been invented with occasions just like this in mind. And there was the sixth, and the answering machine's little spiel, and –

"Hello?" Cinna, much like her ninety-three-year-old great-grandmother, still hadn't realized he could see who was calling before he picked up. She found it rather endearing, really.

"Hey, Cinna. What's up?"

"It's two in the morning here, so not too much. How about you?"

Annie winced. She had forgotten all about the time difference. With how much they'd been messaging each other, it was easy to forget Paris was halfway around the world. More like a quarter of the way, since they were six hours ahead rather than twelve, but whatever. Now, how to approach this subject delicately… "I kinda-sorta have two boyfriends right now." Well, so much for delicate.

"Wait, what?"

"Yeah, I know." She heard laughter on the other side of the line. "Hey, it's not funny! Cinna, this is a serious problem!"

"I go to the fricking City of Light for a year and haven't done more than hold hands in months, and Annie Cresta, blushing virgin extraordinaire, gets all the action. Tell me that isn't funny."

"I'm not a virgin," she protested.

"But you were until junior year."

Why did she tell him stuff like that? Not for the first time, Annie wanted to go back and kick her past self. "Cinna, this isn't a joke. I don't know what to do."

"Alec's name is on your arm, right? That doesn't answer the question for you?"

"It's a little more complicated than that. You know what the other name is?" She traced her fingers over the letters as she spoke, half-praying that one or the other would magically change on her. So far, there'd been no such luck.

"Why would I? Oh, wait. Really? Annie, please tell me I'm wrong on this."

"I really wish I could. Want to hear the story?"

"That would be enlightening, yes."

He listened attentively as she outlined the events of the last two weeks, focusing in particular on her quasi-date with Finnick. "I thought that it'd clear stuff up, that he'd be unpleasant or nasty or I don't know, just somehow really evil? But he seems like a super nice guy, and I don't want him to be."

"So, how does Alec feel about this whole thing? He's always seemed a little possessive."

"Don't make this about you not liking Alec again."

"I'm not saying that as a bad thing, just an observation. I mean, I don't think being possessive is ever a really good thing, but it doesn't have to necessarily be bad. Maybe it's just neutral. And you didn't answer my question. What have you told him?"

She shrugged, then realized he couldn't see her. "Um, nothing?"

"Oh my god, Annie, you're screwed." Even though he was an ocean away and not even trying to be mean, she melted at those words. She really ought to just give up now. It'd be so much easier than putting any more time and energy into the mess she'd created for herself.

"Tell me about it."

"That settles it. There's only one solution."

That piqued her interest. How could it not? "Do tell."

"Three way."

She burst out in giggles. "Cinna, you're as bad as Johanna!"

"Hey!" came a muffled shout from the other room.

Annie tucked the phone into the crook of her neck to shout back. "If you weren't listening in, you wouldn't have heard that." When she heard Johanna's sigh, she turned back to the phone. "Her suggestion was that I just go out with whichever one has the nicer dick."

"Well, I don't know what you straight girls do about things like this!"

"Was that her?" Cinna asked.

"Who else?"

He laughed. "Johanna speaks with much wisdom."

Annie shook her head. "You know I'm not going to tell her you said that."


	4. Chapter 4

Amusing as Jo's suggestion was – and as tempting as she found Cinna's – neither of them seemed all that likely to make things better. Okay, with the possible exception of her sex life. Dear God, was she actually considering this? So much for Cinna's 'blushing virgin' idea.

Nope, not happening. Annie mentally scratched that possibility off her list of possibilities. The one at the very top of the list, the one she didn't like to think about, kept bugging her. She could feel herself in its viewfinder, the crosshairs centered at the middle of her forehead. _You know I'm the right thing to do_ , it shouted, and like the totally responsible college student she was, Annie responded with the mental equivalent of covering her ears and la-dee-dahing away.

But eventually, she had to give in. Her breaking point came on a Tuesday morning three weeks after she first saw Finnick's name in her inbox. Annie would like to believe all that physics garbage about equal and opposite reactions, so she wanted to think there was some kind of trigger for it, but she couldn't come up with one. Maybe she was really scraping the bottom of the barrel on ways to put off doing her math homework? In any case, it didn't matter. Before she could talk herself out of it, Annie grabbed her cell phone from her nightstand.

She rattled off the message to Finnick in no time. _Need to talk. Got time this afternoon?_ Alec's gave her more trouble. It felt wrong to just tweak the message to Finnick for her boyfriend of over a year, but everything else she wrote didn't seem good enough either. If only he didn't get so touchy about things like this. He always made anything that had to do with another man, no matter how innocent, ten times harder than it had to be. Annie collapsed backwards onto her bed. They already had dinner plans set up for tomorrow. She would just bring it up there. Easy-peasy. Yeah, she should probably have things sorted out as soon as possible, but what was college without a heavy dose of procrastination?

* * *

"Good afternoon, Annie." He waved to her from where he sat at the top of the library steps, and she hurried up the stairs to join him. With the sun shining bright above her and the scent of coffee wafting over from the coffee shop next door, it seemed Mother Nature was trying to tell her that everything would be all right. Or giving her an otherwise-okay day as a consolation prize. Y'know, either one.

"Hey, Finnick. How are you doing?" She doubted her smile did a very good job of masking her unease, but Finnick didn't seem to pick up on it. Either that or he was trying to be polite.

"I've been all right. Busy now that the semester's starting to pick up, but good. How about you?"

"I'm okay." No more excuses. Time to hit the nail on the head or whatever that saying was. "I think I need to tell you something." That sounded great. Nothing ominous or awkward about saying that and then not knowing how to follow it up. Great job, Annie. "Umm…"

He watched her, green eyes concerned. "Annie? Are you all –"

Thankfully, she rediscovered the ability to talk. She cut him off before he could finish the question. "Y'know the other name on my arm? It's Alec Crawford, and I've been dating him for a little more than a year." Shit, that hadn't been a good way to put that. She wished she could crawl into some hole somewhere and never come out.

"Oh." Finnick looked down for a moment, biting down on his bottom lip. A few seconds passed, seconds that she should have known what to do with, should have used to somehow comfort him. Instead, Annie sat, and waited, and hoped everything would be all right. Worthless, absolutely worthless. He'd been nothing but kind to her from the moment they met, and here she was, throwing him under some emotional bus and just kind of hoping he'd be able to get up and dust himself off. Finnick nodded and turned back to look at her. His face was stony, unreadable. "I'm sorry to have pushed you."

"No, Finnick, I –"

He shook his head. "I assumed when I shouldn't have. I'm very sorry."

Dear Lord, she wanted to hug and strangle him at the same time. "No, I should have been honest with you about it from the beginning. I'm not sure what to do with it, I just thought you should know."

"And I think I should stay far away from you. Annie, what were you thinking? You came to my office alone. Anything could have happened. I could have robbed you, or raped you, or -"

"But you didn't. That's what matters." He had scooched almost a foot away from her since her revelation, but he was still close enough that she could cup his cheek with her hand. "Finnick, I was scared of you, but I'm not anymore. I want to be careful, of course, but I don't want to assume anything. Fate's weird sometimes, and I have no idea what those names mean in the long run."

He shook his head. "You need to stay safe, Annie. Sorry, but I think this is a bad idea. I don't want you to get hurt, and I particularly don't want to be the one who hurts you." Gently, he moved her hand away, and she allowed him to place it on her lap. There had to be something she could say to stop him, some perfect combination of words that would convince him, but even as he gathered up his things, she could find nothing.

When he started to get up, she found her voice again. "Finnick, you don't have to go."

He smiled, sad and forced and terrible. "It's okay, Annie. You have a good one, all right?"

There existed no nice way to tell someone 'goodbye, have a nice life'. Finnick had found a decent one. All she found was sitting there, watching the other person's back as they walked away.

* * *

"You aren't going to tell me?"

She looked up from her spaghetti. "Tell you what?"

"About the guy you've been seeing."

Annie frowned and took another bite of her pasta while she thought things over. Even spoiling herself with a carb monster loaded with mozzarella and parmesan didn't make her want to eat today. She chewed for several seconds longer than was really necessary before she swallowed. "I'm not seeing anyone else." That wasn't even a lie. Not exactly the truth, fair enough, but not a lie. And you're not allowed to get mad at people for not lying to you.

His fork clattered on the table, a couple drops of marinara sauce flying far enough to land on her hand. "Don't feed me that shit, Annie. I've seen you with him two times in the last week."

She frowned at him. "You don't trust me, do you?"

"Yeah, I'm going to trust you when you were getting cozy with some other guy." His brown eyes flared, and Annie pressed herself further back into her chair. "The fuck have you been doing behind my back?" he shouted. When she flinched, Alec stopped himself. "Sorry, Annie, didn't mean to lose my temper like that." He smiled at her, but the tightness in his features failed to veil his anger.

Annie took a deep, calming breath. "His name is Finnick Odair. He's the other man on my arm, and I was originally assigned to his knot theory discussion section."

"And?" he prompted.

"And," she said, doing her best to keep her voice from shaking, "I don't think I'm ever going to see him again."


	5. Chapter 5

Some things were meant to be counted: days until school ended, cards, how many licks it took to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop, how many M&M's of each color came in a given bag. Okay, maybe that last one could be up for debate, and the casinos would definitely want to argue the counting cards bit, but Annie felt certain about all the others. Days since one last saw the individual that was probably one's worst enemy, notably, did not make the list. Shocker, right?

She hadn't stooped so far as to start tally marks. Annie hadn't wanted to touch _Robinson Crusoe_ with a twenty foot pole when it'd been assigned reading in eighth grade, and she refused to start taking cues from the man now. Dear God, he'd renamed that native… Pacific Islander, maybe? She couldn't remember all the details. To be fair, Defoe hadn't exactly done his cultural anthropology homework either, and Annie hadn't turned the native people into slaves in her novel. Not that she had a novel, but whatever. Defoe might have been a product of his time, but that didn't mean he wasn't a sicko.

Off track again. Fuck. At this rate, this assignment would never get done. Wait, how on earth did this problem even make sense? Annie reread the last couple lines. Definition, definition, then the question wanted her to use the definitions to prove the theorem. That all seemed pretty simple until she reached the hint tacked to the bottom. Deceptively easy, then, and man was that deception ever working on her.

"How's it going, babe? Done yet?" Alec kissed her cheek, a day or two's worth of stubble tickling against her skin. He had gotten off of work early and decided to stop by for a few minutes. She hated herself a little bit for wishing he'd found something else to do with his extra time. He had done a surprisingly good job of staying quiet and busy with his own work these last fifteen minutes or so when she had told him she needed to do her work, though. He had to get some credit for that. Annie doubted she would have done as well had their positions been reversed. Annie couldn't really blame him for wanting to spend some time together. Lord knew they hadn't been doing too much of that lately.

Annie sighed. "Let's just say it could be going a lot better."

He peered over her shoulder to look at her notebook. "You're on question seven. That seems like it's going pretty well to me."

Wordlessly, Annie handed him the assignment sheet. "Twenty problems? Really?"

"I know, right? Mags is as sweet as they come and absolutely brilliant, but I think she thinks we're all math Houdinis."

"You're screwed, Cresta."

"If only."

He grinned. A dark curl had strayed away from the others to lie across his forehead, and she brushed it back into place with her fingers. Handsome devil, he had no right looking that attractive when she was supposed to be doing her math homework. "Is that an invitation?"

She glanced down at her homework again. She'd only managed to finish six problems in the last six days, and it was due tomorrow. Gross. "I really shouldn't…"

"But?"

Annie smiled up at him. "Who said there was a 'but' in there?"

"I heard one."

"Hmm, you're hearing things again? Might want to see a doctor about that." She arched her back as he ran his fingers over her spine, but a quick look at the clock made her change her mind. "Alec, I really need to get this done."

"And you will just as soon as we're done. That's what stud breaks are for."

"Study breaks," she replied, stressing study's second syllable. "And no. I need to do my homework, Jo'll be home any minute and she'll give me shit if she hears us, and I'm not feeling it right now."

"Stud breaks 'cause I'm a stud, of course." He winked, and she couldn't help but admire the long lashes that framed his big, brown eyes. "C'mon, Annie, it'll be fun." He nuzzled into her neck, pressing a kiss or two against her collar bone as he did so.

"Alec, cut it out." She nudged him away. "Maybe this weekend, okay?" she added, hoping to soften the blow.

But male pride was a touchy beast. "Yeah, um, sounds great. Y'know, I'd better get going, and it seems like you've got a lot to get done, so maybe…"

"I'll see you soon?" Annie supplied.

"Yeah, I'll see you real soon," he answered. "Good luck on your homework. I'm glad you're not going into that guy's office any more for help."

A part of Annie wished that he'd given her a chance to respond to that before he'd slammed the door shut behind him. But if she were to be honest with herself, she would have to admit that she had no idea what to say.

* * *

"The exams, in general, went a little worse than the first. Don't worry, that's the pattern we usually see. Scores usually bounce back after this test." Though Annie still had a hard time understanding Mags' somewhat garbled speech sometimes, it was clear enough now that she could make out every individual word. "Finnick, will you hand these out for me?"

Annie did her best to avoid eye contact as he walked from seat to seat, handing back exams. She already knew she hadn't done well. She didn't need him to know it too. It really shouldn't have been a hard exam. The questions were not word for word what they'd seen on the homework, but they'd been about as close as one could get without giving the questions out beforehand. Fair enough, she hadn't studied as much as she maybe should have, but coming in, Annie had felt like she had things under control.

Yeah right.

Maybe a merciful God did exist, because Finnick dropped her test off without a word. Annie didn't dare to look at her score until she got out of the room, half-running all the way back to her apartment. Everyone probably thought she was crazy. Everyone was right. Only when the door was locked behind her – realistically, she knew it made no sense, but since when had making sense really mattered to her? – did she allow herself to check the score.

There had been a time when sixty-nine was a funny number. Okay, it still made her giggle a little, just not in this context. She tossed the exam in the trash bin without going through the problems she'd missed. Sometimes, being a bad student felt good as hell. When you were crying, it lost some of its appeal.

* * *

Swimming seemed an excellent solution to her recent issues. Studies indicated that it reduced stress and sharpened focus. And if that wasn't great enough for you, it got in some great exercise at the same time. What more could you ask for?

For some reason, those studies didn't mention that you had to get up at 5:30 to get to the pool before a bunch of other people got there or that your entire body would be sore after your first time getting back into swimming laps. Funny how that worked. But pain was gain or some shit like that. Annie questioned her sanity as she got into her swimsuit way too early in the morning for the third day in a row. Even earlier today, actually, because there had been other people at the pool by the time she got there yesterday. Fit people who looked like they worked out and ate trendy new superfoods served as a great natural deterrent to keep people who thought superfoods were beer and Pringles out of gyms. Annie was determined that it wouldn't work on her this time.

To be fair, she did know what she was doing in a pool. Swim team in middle school and junior high had ensured that. Still, couch time had outranked gym time on her priorities list these last few years, and she had a little pinch-able roll on her tummy to show for it. Nobody could blame her for not wanting to be at the pool in her (albeit modest) two-piece with a bunch of gym bunnies.

Keys? Check. Phone? Check. Bookbag? Check. She already had her swimsuit on, so no need to worry about that. Could she come up with any last-minute excuses why absolutely could not go to the pool today? Unfortunately, no. All right, then. Best to get on with it. The sooner she started, the sooner she could be done, right?


	6. Chapter 6

Upon entering the pool area, her first sight was the wall of records. They served as a nice reminder of how slow she was, but otherwise, Annie didn't really feel too much about them either way. Maybe they made for nicer decoration than the wall underneath would, maybe not. Carrying around opinions about things like that seemed like a waste of energy.

She nodded at the lifeguard, just like she did every morning. You had to have some serious respect for the little redheaded woman that sat up in that chair all morning, every morning. Annie certainly wouldn't feel safe opening this place up by herself while it was still dark out. Or ever, for that matter, because the hallway leading to the pool gave off every kind of creepy vibe, but maybe that could be blamed on weird radio frequencies or something.

_Shit._ If she hadn't already made eye contact with the lifeguard, Annie would be getting the hell out of here. Since past Annie was an idiot, social norms and all that jazz made her stay. She set her gym bag on the bleachers, just as she did every morning, but she hesitated when the time came to strip down to her swimsuit. Why hadn't she bought that one piece her mother liked so much? Oh yeah, because it hung like a tent, and an ugly one at that, but right now, it seemed like a small price to pay.

Nope, she was not going to let Finnick Odair – who was a really good swimmer, now that she got a good look at him – wreck her workout. Nobody else got to control her life.

He hadn't even noticed her presence. She shouldn't find that surprising, since she definitely didn't look up and check who was coming in every time she heard the locker room doors open, but still. If he was going to be her worst enemy, he should at least do a good job of it.

Aware she had been dawdling long enough to arouse suspicion – though really, the lifeguard was too busy ogling Finnick to notice anything else happening on the pool deck, so she maybe could have slipped away without judgment - she jumped in. Brrr. Not wanting to stretch this out any longer than she had to, she started her first length down the pool. Swimming warmed up the muscles, making the water a lot more bearable. Okay, she didn't know any biology, and that probably wasn't the mechanism behind it, but it wouldn't hurt anyone if she thought that it was. Anyway, it felt good, and freezing now seemed unlikely. It was always good to get back to the important things. _Right, left, right, left, breathe, right, left, right._

Annie did not know how long he had been there before she noticed that a dark, shadowy figure swam only a few feet away. Though her arms burned, she pushed herself harder. Every stroke had to take her farther, and each kick vied to be the one that would get her away from the man. But though she struggled to go faster, and her chest begged her to stop, every time she blinked, the figure moved closer. He couldn't be. He wouldn't do that. And perhaps it was only in her own mind, for distance beneath the surface stretched in ways it wouldn't dare on land, but try as she might, she could not convince herself that she was not being stalked, chased.

Her fingertips reached the wall, and the instant her hands found the edge, she hoisted herself out of the water. She had just broken the surface when she spotted Finnick grinning at her from two lanes away. "Man, you're fast," he said, breathing hard.

Annie felt even more tuckered out than he looked. She sat down on the ledge of the pool, letting her feet dangle into the water. Collapsing sounded better, but sometimes one just had to settle for second best. "I didn't realize we were racing," she replied.

"We weren't until the end there. If you want another chance at beating me, I'd be happy to go another round."

How had he managed to get his breathing under control so quickly? She still felt like keeling over dead might be better than ever getting into a pool again. "Thanks, but I think I'll pass on that one."

"No fun, are you?"

She grinned."Good, you're finally catching on."

He climbed up to sit on the edge as well, just far enough away that he would have to move to reach her. Annie wanted to thank him for that consideration, but there was no way to make that not awkward. _"Gee, thanks for not sitting close to me so I don't have to worry about you trying to drown me while I'm busy talking?"_ Yeah, that was sure to get the conversation going in the right direction.

She checked over her shoulder to make sure the lifeguard was still watching them. She caught the other woman's glare head on, and Annie couldn't quite stop herself from shooting her a too-happy smile back. No judgment, okay? It'd been a while since she'd been the target of female jealousy. It'd be wrong not to take a little advantage of the situation. The lifeguard shook her head and turned away. Okay, fine, happy or not, she made for another level of security.

"Are you listening?" His voice jolted her back into their conversation.

"Um, no, not really? I'll try and be better about it, though. Shoot." _Not literally,_ she added silently.

"I was just asking how knot theory's been going."

"Erm." Ah, her usual brilliance with the English language had returned. Beautiful, stunning, well spoken, might as well just crown her Miss America right now to save some time later. "It's going, for sure."

He chuckled. "Yeah, I think most of the class had a hard time with that last exam. Don't stress yourself out about it, all right?"

Easier said than done. Also, it was really past time to turn this conversation away from her and knot theory's current hatred of one another. "I'll keep that in mind. How has school and everything been going for you?"

"Things have been going pretty well. I've got my quals at the end of the year, and I'm not looking forward to that at all, but it should be all right." He shrugged and grinned. "And if it's not, there's nothing wrong with leaving with a master's degree."

Annie snorted. "I think even trying for a master's degree is being an overachiever, and PhD's are something else. I can't imagine spending what, four, five more years in school."

"Sometimes six or seven," he supplied.

She scrunched up her nose. "I'd be almost thirty by the end of that."

"Yeah, I hope that's not going to be me. There are a few older students – Cashmere's one of the, actually, have you met her? – that have done the whole work for a few years before coming back thing, and I don't understand how they do it. I'm a single guy with no commitments beyond my school, but doing this with kids? I'm in awe."

Annie was pretty sure the point of that wasn't to have her latch onto the word 'single'. But then again, since when was any of this supposed to happen?

* * *

She dodged the shoe, and it smacked into the wall with a swift _crack_. Annie frowned at the clear print left on the wall. If they wanted to have a prayer of getting their deposit back, they were going to have to clean that up. Magic eraser should work, hopefully.

"You're an idiot, Cresta."

Annie nodded. The world had been offering her plenty of reminders of that particular fact recently. The time had come to just accept it.

"The hell is wrong with you?" Johanna half-yelled.

"What's wrong with _me_? Jo, you're the one who just threw a shoe at my face!"

"And it didn't even get the point across!" Her friend collapsed backwards onto the bed, and the mattress bounced slightly beneath the two of them. Annie shut her laptop and moved it to the relative safety of her bedside table. "Hey, Cresta, know what an analogy is?" Jo asked.

"I'm not the one who failed freshman English."

"Now that's hitting below the belt." Johanna paused, waiting for an apology that absolutely wasn't coming. "Fine. Imagine a stick of dynamite with fuses on both sides."

"Okay." Annie nodded. "I gotta say, so far, this is seeming more like a hypothetical and less like an analogy."

"Shut up. Now, imagine you light both of those fuses at the same time. You figure you can keep an eye on both of them at the same time, and for a little while, you're right." She put up a finger to silence Annie before she could ask a question. "They're really long fuses, okay? So, everything seems good while you're looking at each one individually, but you develop a tendency to get wrapped up in one and ignore the other one a little bit. How does the story end?"

"With the whole thing blowing up in my face and a lot of insurance-covered plastic surgery?"

"Forget the second part of that sentence, but you're on the right track."


	7. Chapter 7

Annie groaned and covered her eyes when her phone rang. In her darkened room and with a headache pounding against her skull, the pale blue light felt absolutely blinding, and the cheerful chirping melody might as well have been a siren. She really had nobody to blame but herself, for she easily could've turned it off before she tried to go to sleep, but since when did anyone actually call her anyway? She and her friends almost always texted, and her mom only called on Thursday nights. Oh well, if it was really important, they'd leave a voicemail. Six rings until it went to voicemail. She could last through this.

"Hello, you've reached Annie Cresta. Sorry, I can't come to the phone right now, but leave your name and a message, and I'll get back to you as soon as possible. Bye!" Three, two, one… Okay, no message. Couldn't have been that important then.

She swore when her phone again began to ring. "Just can't leave me alone, can you?" she grumbled as she checked who was calling. "Hey, Alec, what's up?" Annie didn't really care if he could hear her annoyance. It was nothing if not an accurate representation of her mood right now.

"Why didn't you answer the first time I called?"

She ran a hand over her temples rubbing t try to ease some of the tensions there. In the history of humanity, had that ever worked? "I have a headache. I figured I'd let it go to voicemail and call back when I felt better." Annie could feel him frowning at her from the other end. She stopped herself from sighing. "I really am not feeling well, Alec, and you've got ahold of me now. What's up?"

"I got the job."

"That's fantastic!" Even through the din of her headache-cold grossness, she found herself grinning from ear to ear. "Tell me all about it!"

"It's the Seattle one I was telling you about. The one that does the cancer research? I went and visited a couple weeks ago, remember?"

There had been an interview in Seattle? Okay, Worst Girlfriend of the Year goes to Annie for not knowing what the fuck her boyfriend's up to. To be fair, he had been on like fifty interviews (more like five, but whatever) in the couple months. Some people managed to be smart and have in-demand majors and be personable and graduate a semester early. Not that she was jealous or anything. In awe made a better descriptor. Wait, she was supposed to be contributing to this conversation. "That's great! I'm so happy for you."

"We'll move out there right after Christmas, have a couple weeks to settle in before I start. My first day's the fifteenth of January." Alec sounded so proud of himself. Good for him. He deserved it.

"Wow, they want you to start really soon." It was what, November second? Maybe the third. She didn't feel like walking over to her calendar to check.

"I mean, it is two and a half months before I'd start."

"I know. I'm just going to miss you."

He paused for a long moment, and she half-wondered if their call had been disconnected. "Annie, you're coming with me, right? I'd be awfully lonely out there without you."

"I… I'm not sure." Nope, that wasn't enough for right now. Annie searched for something more to say. "I really don't know, Alec. How far away is Seattle? Twenty hours or something?"

"Google Maps says thirty-five hours driving from Lexington, but it's only a seven hour flight." You could always trust Alec to know stuff like that. Most days, she found it endearing.

"Yeah, only a seven hour flight. Easy trip, no big deal. It's not like that's most of a day or anything."

"You don't need to get so worked up over this. I thought you were excited for me. I thought you wanted me to be happy."

"And I do!" she protested. "I'm just pissed that you think I'm going to drop everything – not graduate, leave my lease, move thirty freaking hours away from my entire family – for a job you just got ten minutes ago!"

"Who said I didn't want you to graduate? I bet the math department would let you take a class or two online to finish up the major. Even if they won't, there's plenty of colleges in Washington. I'm sure you could get into one of them and get your degree. C'mon, Annie, it'll be an adventure. I'll be lonely out there if it's just me."

She chewed on her lower lip as she mulled it over. "Please, Annie? I love you a lot."

She sighed. "I really don't know, Alec. I don't feel my best right now, and I really need to think this over for a couple days."

"All right. Really do think about it, though. It'll be an incredible opportunity for the two of us."

An incredible opportunity for him, and she would be giving up her chance to graduate with her friends and be near her mother, father, and sister. All for no job and no security beyond her boyfriend's – not even fiancée's – generosity. What a great deal. "I will. I'm so proud of you. You really deserved this."

"Thanks, love. Can I take you out tomorrow to celebrate?"

"I'll have to make that a tentative yes. Let's see how I feel tomorrow night."

"Sounds great. Feel better, Annie."

"Live it up for me tonight, all right?"

He laughed. "Bye, love you."

"Bye." Annie collapsed backwards onto her bed. Though she landed in a less-than-comfortable position, she felt no real urge to move. Instead, she laid there, staring up at the ceiling and thinking until it was time for another dose of NyQuil. Even after she fell asleep, she could think of little but Alec, Seattle, and a life she wasn't sure she wanted to live.

* * *

"I think I need to know who Coriolanus Snow is." She had decided the best way to deal with this was to be direct about it. When she had talked her way through this conversation earlier, it had seemed the easiest way to get the conversation to this point. It had worked pretty well in her other interactions with Finnick, hadn't it? No need to fix what ain't broken. Now, as a silence just as awkward as most of the ones she caused hung between them, she really wished she had tried a different tactic.

"What do you want to know about him?" Finnick asked, his words slow and careful.

"Well, judging by the way you immediately assumed I was your soulmate, I'm guessing you've already met him."

He nodded. "And?" She could hear the splash of the tiny waves against the side of the pool, and Annie felt the ever-silent lifeguard's eyes burning into the back of her skull. Here she was, dragging not only Finnick, but also the poor (if annoyingly jealous) lifeguard into her messes. Just fantastic. Who else could make their now-daily early morning pool meetups into one of the most awkward conversations of her life?

"And I want to know why you think there's no chance he's the right man - well, I'd assume he's a man, given the name, anyway - for you." Finnick usually seemed so strong, but now, his face tightened and his eyes dulled in a way she could only describe as haunted. She did what any reasonable person would and backtracked. "I'm sorry if that's too personal. We don't really know each other that well yet, and I don't want to be nosy."

He laughed, but it was forced. "Yeah, you do. Everyone wants to be nosy every once in a while."

"But I really don't want to make you uncomfortable."

"No, it's fine. Just…" He stared downa t his lap, picking at the edge of his swim trunks as he considered his next words. "Snow is a very, very creepy old man who hurt me a lot when I was younger. Trust me, we aren't getting together anytime soon." He cracked something close to a smile at that, but he still didn't look up from his lap.

Annie hated that she could read between the lines of his statement, hated that anyone would dare hurt Finnick, or any child for that matter, like that. "Are you all right? Is there any way I can help?"

"No, I don't think you can do too much about a man who's an ocean away and dead."

"Good riddance."

"Yeah," he agreed. Again, that silence. "So, what brought that up?"

"Um, nothing." Annie had never been a very good liar. "I just have some things to think about, and I wanted to be able to make a well-informed decision." Not sure what to do with her hands, Annie gave him an awkward pat on the shoulder. Finnick didn't push her away, but he did raise an eyebrow at her rather poor attempts at being comforting. Okay, good. That hadn't been going very well anyway. "You ready to get in the water?"

"Always. Beat you down and back, Cresta." He rose to his feet and jackknifed into the water with one fluid motion.

"Hey, not fair!" By this time, he was already a good fifteen meters out. She definitely had her work cut out for her if she wanted a shot at beating him. Unfortunately for Finnick Odair, no Cresta had ever shied away from a challenge. Half a second later, Annie was in the water, propelling herself forward as fast as she possibly could.


	8. Chapter 8

Annie had a great many things to thank her maternal grandfather for. He had been brave and/or crazy enough to both go to an all-white college and marry her white grandmother in 1957 Illinois, helping break down all kinds of barriers for African Americans. When she and her Cresta cousins went swimming in the summer, she always came away with a tan while they fried to a cringe worthy shade of lobster pink.

On the less positive side, his genes were also to blame for her hair situation today. It looked like a stylist had snorted cocaine and then gone nuts on a pot of ramen noodles with her curling iron. Annie was pretty sure she had a few brush bristles still hanging out somewhere in the mess, but she didn't have time to dig them out. She tossed her hairbrush into her gym bag and hurried out to where Finnick waited. "Hey there, Odair."

He looked up from fiddling with his phone and stuffed it into his front pocket. "I wondered how long it'd be until you figured that one out."

"The rhyme?"

Finnick nodded, his solemn expression ruined by the grin he gave her at the end. "It's right up there with the 'Odair he is.'"

"Sad, I thought I was being creative." She sighed, wincing at the soreness that even that small movement caused. Annie hadn't felt too bad while in the pool, but maybe she wasn't as over that lovely cold and headache combination as she'd thought. "So, where you headed?" she asked as they stepped out of the gym. The sun was just beginning to peek out over the horizon, and Annie could count on one hand the number of people she saw on the usually-busy campus. Somehow, she had successfully turned herself into a morning person over these last few weeks, probably largely due to how wonderful this hour or so in the morning between her workout and the earliest class was. She could spread out in whatever spot in the library she wanted, grab coffee if she needed some, and get a good chunk of reading done all before she would have dragged herself out of bed only a few weeks prior.

And right now, there was a conversation she really should be paying attention to. If she could break her waking up at nine o'clock habit, she should be able to figure out how to be a halfway-decent listener. "Patterson," Finnick supplied, probably for the second time. He was a lot better than most people about realizing when she'd tuned out. "I need to get some work done before class today, but I've got a few minutes if you want me to walk you somewhere."

It was a sweet offer, considering that pretty much anywhere on campus was further away than Patterson Hall, but today, she wouldn't be taking him up on it. "I think I'll head over to Patterson too."

"You sure? I really do have time."

"Completely."

He smiled down at her. "So what you're saying is I do get to escort you to your destination."

"I suppose so."

"And now I shall die content, knowing that I have kept a beautiful woman safe."

She rolled her eyes. "I have to worry a little if walking someone a hundred yards is actually your life goal."

"Just a little?"

On a whim, she took hold of his hand. He didn't pull away, instead giving her hand a gentle squeeze and lacing their fingers together. "I don't have enough time to worry more than a little about you."

"You were trying to find a way to make that rhyme with my name, weren't you?"

"Yeah. There's a reason I'm not getting my degree in poetry."

"Annie, I think the fact that you think poetry should rhyme is a good enough reason for you to not get a degree in it." He did have his hand-holding technique down pat, just enough closeness without having it be sweaty or hot to the point of being gross, and that was all that saved him from being elbowed in the gut.

* * *

"You could've been honest about why you don't want to move. I wouldn't have been mad."

She frowned as she looked up from the drink menu. "Sorry, what?"

Alec leaned back in their booth, arms crossed. "I know you've been seeing him again." He practically snarled the reference to Finnick, and Annie knew better than to mention that his tone suggested he definitely would have been mad if she'd mentioned her swimming almost-dates. "I don't know why you try to keep these things from me," he continued. "I thought you had this whole thing figured out."

"He just happens to go swimming at the same time I do. It's no big deal." Okay, relationships should be based on trust and mutual respect and all that, but sometimes, it was all right to fudge the truth just a little. Fibbing was especially okay when it would avoid a fight in a crowded restaurant, because she really couldn't handle that kind of embarrassment right now. She would tell him the truth later, or at least something close to it. How exactly to go about that, she could figure out later.

"Yeah, I'm sure. Y'know, it's no big deal when I hang out with and hold hands with other girls, either."

She flushed all the way up to her ears. "Alec, can we talk about this later? I don't want to make a scene."

"You're already making a scene of yourself!" He slammed his hand down on the table with enough force that a few people at the bar turned to stare at them. Annie sunk down into her seat, wishing she could just disappear, but Alec didn't back down. "You make a fool out of me every time you see him, and I can't deal with it anymore. Let's be clear, Annie. I love you, and if you loved me a hundredth as much, you wouldn't go anywhere near Finnick Dare or whatever his name is ever again." He had leaned across the narrow table as he spoke, and now only a few inches separated their faces. As much as she wanted to, Annie couldn't avoid making eye contact. She didn't want to see the hurt there, the hurt she'd caused. "Don't you understand what you're doing to me?" he asked, soft now, and she could hear the desperation in his voice.

"I'm sorry," she whispered.

"Then show me you mean it."

She closed the gap between them to kiss him. "Finnick's my friend, and I'm not going to stop seeing him, but you can trust me that nothing is happening between us. I'll be more careful in the future to not give you – or him, for that matter – any idea that there's anything more than friendship there."

His brow furrowed, and Annie could see the exact lines of where his wrinkles would start in fifteen, twenty years. "How would you feel if I met up with a Victoria's Secret model every morning, cuddled up to her when you weren't around? Would you be okay with that, huh?"

Annie wanted to say that of course she would, that she trusted him just like he should trust her, but it was all a lie, every last word. She focused on a stain on the table, the one she'd tried to rub away with a napkin when they'd first sat down what felt like forever ago. The spot kept moving on her, and she was having to blink far too much, and she couldn't break down here, she just couldn't. "I want to go home now," she choked out.

"Annie. _Annie._ " He tucked a finger under her chin and made her look at him. "It's fine, all right? Don't cry." He wiped away a tear with his thumb, his touch so wonderfully gentle. "Just don't mess around with him, and we won't have any issues. Sound good?"

She nodded, not really wanting to agree, but hating the idea of making any more of a mess of herself than she already had.

He smiled, handsome as ever, and gestured down towards her discarded menu. "So, how do fish tacos sound to you? I think we've ordered the beef the last few times we've been, and it might be nice to mix it up a bit."

"Sounds great." Her throat burned, but she did her best to keep a smile firmly in place. Fake it 'til you make it, that's what Mom said. If she pretended for long enough that they were a happy couple with nary a care in the world, then someday, they would be. She refused to believe anything else.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger warnings for domestic abuse.

She carefully examined the bed, smoothing out each and every wrinkle in the comforter, lifting up the blankets one by one. Annie had already been surprised by one giant spider. She wasn't going to make that mistake again. The bed squeaked as though she was trying to murder it when she hopped on. God, this hotel sucked. No matter how long she ran it, the water never got warm, the coffee in the lobby might as well have been oil sludge, and every single surface felt just a little bit grimy. The best part? They were shelling out a hundred and thirty bucks a night for this pit. If that didn't convince Alec they couldn't afford to live in this part of Seattle, she didn't know what would.

She ought to just give up. Everything she saw as a drawback, he managed to interpret as an asset. Couldn't find anything that fit Annie's (admittedly limited) tastes for lunch? What an opportunity to try new foods! The only things they could afford anywhere near Alec's work are tiny studio apartments that still cost twice what she'd been paying for her and Jo's spacious one bedroom in Lexington? I've been wanting to clean all the junk out of my life and live a more minimalist lifestyle! It will rain almost every day and almost never get above eighty degrees? Annie, you hate those hot, humid Kentucky summers! She swore to God that man would be lucky to make it back to Lexington alive. She had wasted her Thanksgiving break apartment hunting out here only to find that she hated this place.

Okay, that wasn't fair. She didn't actually hate Seattle. True, hating both most vegan foods and all seafood would be a little bit of a struggle here, and the weather was shit, but everywhere had its downsides. Annie would be more than happy to come and visit again, but to live here was a different story. It would take her an absolute minimum of six, seven hours and three hundred dollars to get home to Lexington, completely wiping out the possibility of weekend visits. Her mother would hate having her so far away.

Even the wildlife was trying to warn her away. A giant, hairy brown spider had climbed on her hand! Alec had suggested that maybe the poor little guy was just trying to make a friend. In related news, he had been banished from their hotel room so that she could get some work done.

One more check for critters later, she was finally ready to get started. The English went quickly enough. She liked that about literature classes: take the number of pages you had to read, divide by the number of pages you can read per hour, and you had a pretty solid estimate of how long it'd take to finish an assignment. Math was an entirely different story. By the middle of the first problem, she was stuck. Like saber tooth tiger in a tar pit stuck. Some archaeologist or paleontologist or something would probably come and dig her up in a couple thousand years. She hoped said scientist looked like Harrison Ford.

Indiana Jones fantasies weren't helping her get done any faster. Time for the big guns. Finnick had told her he wasn't doing anything with his long weekend. _Got a minute?_ she texted him.

_Yeah. How's Seattle?_

_Alright. Can I ask you about a homework problem?_

Curse those blinking ellipses of doom. It wasn't technically cheating, because he would help her with questions like these in office hours, but something about texting him for help from a thousand miles away made this feel not quite right. Finally, his message appeared. _Sure. What's the problem?_

She took a picture of the problem set and sent it to him. _Third part of #1. Any ideas?_

_Theorem 7.8 maybe?_ Damn, he'd figured that one out quick.

No, wait, that's what she'd already tried. _Not working for me?_

_U got Skype? I think I need to talk you through a picture._ What kind of person used correct capitalization in their texts but then used _u_ instead of _you_?

_im anniecresta123_

_Creative._

She snorted out loud at that. Thank goodness she was alone. _thanks. so whats yours_

_finnickandhistrident_

_that sounds like a euphemism for something. I rly hope u dont use that for work_

He chose to ignore that. _Wait one sec and Ill get you added._

Sure enough, no more than a minute later, she was accepting his request, and it only took a few seconds after that for a grainy, hotel Wi-Fi quality image of Finnick to appear on her screen. Even on the low-resolution image, it was obvious he hadn't bothered to brush his hair yet today, despite the fact that it was close to six PM in Lexington, and she would bet just about anything that he hadn't shaved either. "Can you hear me?" he asked. She hadn't realized how much she missed his voice after only a few days apart.

Annie filed away that observation for later. She didn't have time to think about shit like that right now. "Yep, you're actually pretty clear."

"That's surprising."

She grinned. "Looks like Microsoft isn't out to get us today. There's a first time for everything, isn't there?"

"I guess so." He brought up a notebook on which had been sketched a larger version of the problem. "Can you see this okay?" Annie glanced behind her for spider-spotting purposes before scooching backwards in the bed and adjusting her screen to a better angle. The shift, which couldn't have been more than an inch or two, made the image far clearer. She nodded.

"Okay, so you see this knot?" He held up an image that only a few months prior she would have considered a doodle to some really confused tapeworms. "What do you know about this knot?"

Annie carefully copied it down and stared at it for a long moment. "It's one-adjacent to the unknot, for starters." She gave it another couple seconds. "Okay, my goal is to show it is not also two-adjacent to the unknot, right?" God damn it, why had she signed up for this class? Not for the first time, Annie considered the very real possibility that she might be a bit of a masochist when it came to math.

"Yeah, you're on the right track. Don't worry, this is supposed to be a hard one."

The door opened, and Annie smiled across the room at Alec. "Hey. How was your walk?"

"Who are you talking to?"

"Just getting some help on my math homework."

The change in him was immediate. Alec slammed the room door shut with enough force that the walls rattled. Annie cringed, waiting for the cheesy prints of the Seattle skyline above the bed to come crashing down on her, but thank goodness, neither of them did. "Annie, what's going on? Are you okay?" Finnick's voice was concerned, but there was nothing she could do to reassure him now.

"It's him, isn't it?" Alex roared.

"Annie, are you all right? Do you need someone to call the police?"

She shook her head. "No, no, I'm fine. Don't worry about me. We'll talk again –"

Alec ripped her laptop out of her hands. "You stay away from her, you hear? I don't know what your game is, but she's mine, and there's nothing you can do to change that."

"Alec, cut it out. I'm sorry, Finnick."

His gaze snapped towards her. "Be quiet. You're not a part of this. It's between me and him." Alec then turned back to the screen. "I don't want to hear anything about you again, Odair, you hear? Whatever it is you and Annie have, it's over. I see you around her again, and I'll –"

Oh, hell no. She wasn't about to let anyone talk to her like that. "Excuse me? I'm not a part of this? This is about me! If you don't like what I do, you can talk to me about it."

"I have talked to you about it! And yet you still insist on going behind my back, making me look like a goddamn fool, to see this fucker!" She reached for her computer, trying to claw it out of his hands, but he slammed the laptop shut, barely missing her fingers. "The hell do you think you're doing, Annie? You want to make a fool out of me, mess around while I sit around waiting for you? Me, I offer you everything. Fuck, I was ready to support you, let you stay at home like some fucking pampered princess while I worked my ass off, and you were ready to throw that all away for that bastard!"

Annie shook her head. "No, we're not doing this right now. We're both angry, and this isn't working out. We can talk later, when we've both had a chance to calm down." She tried to slip past him towards the bathroom, but he wouldn't budge. Annie rolled her eyes. "Come on, Alec, we're not going to have a productive conversation right now. Let me go."

"No." She tried pushing past him, but he grabbed her arm. "You never want to have this 'productive conversation.' I've tried, again and again, to get you to agree to something, but you just brush me off! No more of that. We're setting down some rules right now, and this time, you are going to follow them."

"Let go. You're hurting me."

"So it matters when I hurt you, but not when you hurt me?" His grip tightened, and she hissed in pain. Suddenly, he let go, pushing her backwards as he did so. The back of her head crashed against the sharp corner of a half-wall, sending a screaming, bright white pain shooting through her. She screamed as for a brief, terrifying instant, her vision went white. "Stop it. You're not hurt."

This time, the instant she felt his hands on her, she scratched at them, doing everything she could to keep him away from her. When he still insisted on coming closer, she slammed her foot down on his, earning a curse in return. She then pushed away with all her might, and it sent him stumbling back a step or two. Annie didn't pause to see if he fell. She sprinted towards the bathroom, locking the door shut behind her. She hated the glimpse of herself she caught in the bathroom mirror. She looked like a nightmare, her hair wild, her eyes blown wide. Her hands shook with far and adrenaline as she explored the tender area at the back of her skull, trying to assess the damage as Alec banged on the door, demanding that he be allowed inside.


	10. Chapter 10

"Annie?" This time, the knock was soft. Good. Earlier, she had worried that he was going to break down the door. "Annie, I'm really sorry about that. I don't know what I was thinking." He paused, giving her a chance to say something that she chose not to take. "Can you come out of there? I'm ready to talk now, and we really should take a look at your head to make sure you're all right."

Annie sat on the floor, her knees tucked to her chest, her back against the cabinets. She had been in the same position for hours, and getting up, finally leaving this room sounded so tempting. Still, she knew better. "I don't want to stay with you tonight."

He sighed. "You realize you don't have anywhere else to stay, right? I'm not shelling out another hundred and thirty bucks so you can sleep in a different room. There's two beds. If you really want to, you can sleep in the other one."

"Just leave me alone, Alec." Her head still hurt, but after almost an hour looking over it with her hand mirror and the larger vanity mirror, she was convinced it wasn't cut. There wasn't much she could do about the bruise that was developing there or the ones in the shape of Alec's fingertips on her arm. She would figure those out later. Right now, she needed to focus on not adding another bruise to her collection. "Can you pass in my cell phone?" She hadn't thought to grab it before she had fled in here.

"No, you can come out and get it yourself."

"Alec, please." She couldn't stand the note of pleading that had crept into her voice.

"Why do you want it? So you can call Finnick?"

"I want it because it's mine and it's pretty boring in here." Actually, she wanted it to take pictures of her bruises before they faded and to text her parents about what had happened, but he didn't need to know that. Maybe a super lighthearted approach to this would work. "Come on, you know how bad my Candy Crush addiction is. I can't go cold turkey like this." It would have been more convincing if her voice hadn't cracked halfway through.

"When you're ready to act like an adult and come out of there, you can have your phone. Until then, I think you can go without it."

* * *

She stayed awake and locked in that bathroom the entire night. Thankfully, there were no spider sightings, though Annie did spot a couple of little black ants. She didn't kill them until one decided to climb on her. There were limits on how far she would allow that whole 'live and let live' thing go. By three o'clock, she was hungry. By seven, she was starving. It didn't matter that she hadn't eaten breakfast before nine in the last week, or that dinner last night had been enormous. It got to the point where she seriously considered eating the Altoids she'd found in one of the drawers of the vanity even though the tin was open and she'd found one of the ants in that drawer.

Tired, hungry, and cranky as could be, she emerged only when the cleaning lady came in. Thank God Alec had never remembered to use the 'do not disturb' sign in his life. It had bitten them in the ass that time they went to Cabo over spring break, but today, it was her saving grace. She smiled sweetly at the woman and hurried out of the room before Alec could say anything. Free continental breakfast had never sounded better.

Edit that. Free continental breakfast had never sounded _or tasted_ better. Who cared if the coffee had a weird consistency or the fruit had obviously been sitting out for way too long? She had food, and she wasn't in fetal position in a bathroom, and she had time to sit and really think hard about things. A few people gave her dirty looks for wearing her pajamas to breakfast, but hey, nobody here was paying for a five-star experience. You kind of had to expect some trailer trash behavior at this establishment.

Getting home shouldn't be too bad. She could stay down here or in the lobby until it was time to go to the airport. There'd be the taxi ride to the airport, sure, but she could handle twenty minutes in a car with him. If someone else was there, he wouldn't dare bring up what had happened last night. How rude would it be to sit in the front with the driver instead of in the back? She could get changed at the airport. Yeah, she would feel bad about taking the handicapped stall, but she would make sure to hurry, and this was an emergency. Then there'd be the flights, which thankfully, they hadn't been willing to pay the extra thirty dollars to sit together on, and Johanna would pick them up at the airport to take them home. Okay, yeah, this seemed totally doable. She could one hundred percent manage this.

Annie thought about getting seconds on the coffee, but by that time, she was awake and put together enough to have rediscovered her standards.

* * *

"The hell happened to you?" Annie shook her head at Johanna, hoping she would take the hint, but since when had subtlety ever worked on Jo? "C'mon, let me see it." Her fingers were surprisingly gentle as she traced the obvious bump that had developed on the back of her head. "Damn, girl. That's not even a goose egg. That's a fucking dragon egg. How did you manage that? Fall off the Space Needle or something?"

"She tripped backwards on the stairs," Alec supplied. Oh, so he had come up with something. That really shouldn't surprise her. Annie nodded weakly and gave Jo the least convincing fake smile ever. "You should've been there, Johanna. It was scary as it was happening, but I think we'll both be able to look at it and laugh someday." He reached up towards the front seat to take Annie's hand, but she crossed her arms in front of her chest to stop him.

Johanna looked between the two of them. "Oh yeah, head injuries are so effing funny. Did you see that Will Smith movie about concussions? I don't remember what it was called, but everybody was saying it was the comedy of the season."

"Jo, please stop." She rubbed her temples.

"Got a headache? I guess I'd be surprised if you didn't. There's Advil in the glove compartment if you need some."

The car was silent for a coupe minutes before Alec spoke up. "Hey, thanks for picking us up. We really appreciate it."

"No problem. How was the trip? Find somewhere for next semester?" Oh no, she was going to cry just thinking about it. No, Annie wouldn't let him see her visibly upset. She refused to give him that satisfaction. He'd apologized again and again on their way home, any time they were out of earshot of another person, and so far, she had managed to keep calm and composed and give him a very thorough silent treatment. She'd be damned if she broke down not even a mile and a half away from his apartment. Five minutes tops until they dropped him off. She could keep it together for five more minutes. She just needed to tune him out and pretend like he didn't exist.

Five minutes was three hundred seconds, and in that time she could count to a hundred eleven and a half times. Annie didn't think she'd ever need to know that, but at least today wasn't a total waste. She waved at Alec as he got out of the car. The entire car bounced when he closed the trunk. Once he was at the door to his building, Jo turned to her. "So, how did you actually get that bump?" From the look on her face, it was clear she already had a hypothesis, and a good one at that.

"Um…" Annie started.

"I know how it happened, and it wasn't an accidental fall down the stairs. I just want to hear you say it."

"Okay, he pushed me against the wall." The confession was out, it just made her want to keep going. "I just happened to go head to a little jut-out corner on the wall."

Johanna paused, and Annie worried about what she was thinking. About to call her out for lying, tell her that a nice, polite guy like Alec would never lay a hand on a woman… "Well, as far as I can see, we have two options."

"Wait, what?"

"Well, we could go straight to the emergency room. You really ought to have that thing looked at." Okay, yes, good thoughts, but Annie was going to hold out until she heard the other option. "Or, y'know, it's a weekend, so I figured that since I had some free time, I'd spend some time at the batting cage." Ah, she liked where this was headed. "I've still got a couple baseball bats in the back of my car."

But assault charges existed, and Annie would really like to keep that stupid speeding ticket as the only thing on her criminal record. "Let's do the hospital first. Give me a rain check on beating the crap out of him?"

"Well now, what kind of friend would I be if I didn't?"


	11. Chapter 11

The good news was that she didn't have a concussion. Still, she spent a week at home with her parents, just in case. That became a bit of a mantra for them over those seven days. There was a therapy session (just in case), a second doctor's appointment (just in case), and a mother-daughter day spent going out to lunch and shopping (not just in case, more just for fun). During the day, she kept up on school work, ran until her knees threatened to give out underneath her, and spent hours cooking and cleaning and trying not to think.

Thinking became the enemy. When she wasn't busy doing something, it became impossible to keep her mind from wandering back to what she could have done differently, how she could have defused the situation before he'd pushed her. Was it really so unreasonable to not want your significant other seeing another person? And he hadn't really meant to hurt her. If she had been just a couple inches further to one side or the other, what would have happened? Would she be as angry if she had hit the wall or fallen onto the bed? Their minds might be what separated humans from the other animals, but it would be nice if they came with an off switch. If she ever met God or Darwin, she'd have to bring that up.

As usual, Alec wasn't helping matters. She informed Alec that he was no longer a part of her life and that she would go to the police if necessary. He made no effort to see her, but he did text her several times a day. Most were sweet. _Baby, please. I promise I'll never do anything like that again. I love you more than I knew I was capable of. It was a mistake. Never in a million years would I ever dream of hurting you._ When those didn't work, the tone shifted. _You're making a mistake. You'll never meet someone as good as me. I'll make you regret this._

She kept those texts stored in a folder on her phone with images of her injuries and a written account of events. It was a real feel-good kind of thing. Still, it helped to have everything in one place. When she was up at night, wondering if maybe she should take him back, Annie would flip through them. It helped.

* * *

On Sunday, her father dropped her off at her apartment with a tight hug and a promise to kill that bastard if he ever laid a hand on her again. There were enough household chores to keep her occupied until it was time to sleep. Annie had never before appreciated Johanna's complete inability to take care of their living space. Give it another day or two, and she was sure the charm would wear off.

Night brought her demons back. Like vampires, they stayed dormant during the day, but the instant she crawled into bed, they swarmed over her. Those same worries and doubts played through her mind again and again. Someone could make a mint by inventing bad thought garlic and bad thought holy water. She knew she'd be willing to shell out some serious money for them.

One could only stare at the ceiling or count sheep for so long before it drove someone mad. Annie had tried counting lions as well, on the off chance that it worked differently, but there were no breakthrough discoveries that night. She watched as the clock rolled through the hours. Midnight, one, two, three... She gave up on sleeping at four twenty, roughly an hour before she would normally have gotten up to go swimming.

"Where are you going?" Johanna mumbled.

"Swimming."

"I thought the doctor said you couldn't." Her friend rolled onto her stomach and propped herself up to look at the clock, squinting at the glowing blue numbers for a moment before they clicked. "Anyway, 's early. Go back to bed."

She shook her head. "I need to get out of here before I go nuts. Goodnight, Johanna." Annie finished getting dressed with a little noise as possible. With any luck, the other woman wouldn't remember a word of this conversation when she woke up.

Her gym bag sat in the same spot it always did, her tennis shoes neatly beside it. Walking alone, even before the sun rose, had never bothered her in the past, but today, Annie clung tightly to the tiny bottle of mace her father had given her. Every shadow was a threat, a monster ready to jump out at her, and the streetlights' murky haloes offered no real comfort. Though the walk to the fitness center lasted less than ten minutes, but it stretched on for what felt like hours.

All of that discomfort melted away as she stepped onto the pool deck. The over-chlorinated pool water smell attacked her nose. The redheaded lifeguard, whose name Annie had still not bothered to learn, even after coming here for months, sat in her usual chair, looking slightly less annoyed at Annie's existence than normal. Finnick was already in the water, swimming faster than anyone outside Olympians really had any right to. All together, it felt kind of like a welcome home hug, but not a particularly nice one. Maybe a welcome home hug to a home where half the people there didn't really like you very much. Okay, that had gone downhill fast. Happy thoughts, remember?

She jumped it feet-first, not worrying about technique, form, or any of those other stupid little details. The water was a bit on the chilly side, but she'd warm up to it quickly enough. The first lap just loosened up her muscles. On the second, she really gave it everything she could. By the time she reached the end of the pool, she was panting and pretty much ready to collapse. Funny how exercising on no sleep made you want to do that.

"I didn't expect to see you here so early." She looked over to the next lane to see Finnick grinning back at her. He hadn't bothered to wear a cap today, and his bronze hair was plastered around hi face in all kinds of crazy, vaguely geometric patterns.

Annie moved her goggles up to her forehead. "And I wasn't expecting you, either. Isn't this earlier than you usually come?"

He shrugged. "Not really. I moved my schedule back a little bit so I could see you, but before that, I usually came around this time. Since I didn't see you last week at all, I figured you probably weren't coming back."

"But here I am."

"But here you are." He gave her a tight little smile before his eyes flicked away from hers. "So, um, I don't quite know how to ask this without being rude, but are you all right?"

Her immediate impulse was to brush that away with an _I'm fine,_ _don't worry about me_ , but she fought that. Now that certain doubts had been resolved, would it really help her to lie to this person? "I think I'm going to be," she answered after a long moment.

"That's good to hear. I tried to call the police when someone kept ignoring my calls that night, but I realized I had no idea where you were staying." He looked around, and she could almost see the thoughts buzzing through his mind. "Well, since you're here, I suppose that you and Alec are no longer an item?"

Got straight to the point, didn't he? "Yeah, that'd be about right."

"Great. Um, I mean, um…"

"No, trust me, it's a good thing." No reason to make him flounder for words when no apologies were necessary.

He lifted himself out of the water to sit on the edge, and Annie joined him. Getting out sent goosebumps erupting all over her arms, and now that she was out of the water, she couldn't hide the little pudge that crept over the waistband of her bikini bottom. Still, she felt… something. Not quite comfortable or perfectly at ease, but it was kind of soft and nice and she wouldn't mind staying here a while. Finnick, though, seemed to be having a bit of a harder time of this. He fiddled with his goggles and looked up at the clock for a second before he met her eyes again. "Well, I don't know if this is a good time to ask, but do you have Friday night free?" He paused for hardly more than a heartbeat before he started backtracking. "Or Saturday or Sunday – any time at all, really. I can clear up my schedule if a time will work for you."

She mulled it over for a moment. "I think we've come to the same conclusion, right?"

"About?"

Annie pointed to her upper arm, where _Finnick Odair_ was neatly printed, and Finnick nodded. "And I'm really, really happy about that," she continued. "But I don't think I'm ready for that yet. I mean, I dated Alec for just short of two years. If we want this to last – and I really do – I don't think now is the right time."

"Okay." He still sounded worried.

"But I would still like to come and swim with you every morning. I might even let you walk me to wherever it is I'm headed next."

Finnick snorted. "Ooh, walking Annie to class. Aren't I just the luckiest guy on earth?"

"You'd better believe it."


	12. Chapter 12

The right time came in early March. Honestly, it probably should have come well before then, but spending over a month on different continents when Finnick went home to visit his family hadn't helped matters. As much fun as it would be to blame it all on Finnick, she had to take some credit as well. The fact that Annie's new boss didn't really understand the concept of free time definitely contributed. Oh well, the blame game probably wasn't the best use of her time. Annie looked at herself in the mirror. Hair up, green dress, somewhat made up… ten out of ten would bang. Fine, maybe more like a nine, nine and a half. Pretty damn fine either way.

"You've been dating him for six months. I don't think you need to worry too much about this." Johanna hadn't even looked up from her laptop.

Well, she did have a point there, but that didn't mean Annie had to care. Also, love was no place for logic. "I would still like to look nice for him."

"How liberated of you. That one wouldn't leave a hundred years of feminists rolling in their graves." Annie tossed a pillow at Johanna, hitting her on the side of her head. "Hey!"

"Hey is for horses." She added a bobby pin to the (really rather impressive) updo. "And I can look nice for him and myself at the same time, thank you very much."

"Sassy."

"And sexy?" She spun, letting Johanna get the full, 360-degree view.

She rolled her eyes. "Okay, I see were guys are coming from. You straight girls are fucking insane."

"Ugh, Jo, just tell me I'm pretty, and I'll get out of your hair."

"Gorgeous." She immediately returned to her computer. It was hard to pull an animal out of its natural habitat for long.

"You're too kind. Okay, bye!" She picked up her purse and slung it over her shoulder. It didn't really match the rest of the outfit, but she could deal with that. There was approximately a zero percent chance Finnick – or Johanna, for that matter – would notice her inattention to detail.

"Have fun. Don't get pregnant."

Well, she had the right idea, if not the most charming sentiment. "Thank you for breaking my goals for tonight into their component elements."

"I knew there was a reason you kept me around."

* * *

She had all the nerves that went with a first date but none of the uncertainty. Even after three and a half years living in Lexington, she still lacked any concept of how long it would take her to walk places, meaning she had arrived twenty minutes early. Five or six minutes late would have been preferable. Then she wouldn't be getting the _poor girl, her date must have stood her up_ looks, and her waitress wouldn't have seemed so uncomfortable when she came to refill Annie's drink before her date had even arrived. Wait, there definitely needed to be a 'maybe' in with the waitress somewhere. She seemed like she was always somewhat uncomfortable. "You're looking lovely this evening." Annie jumped at the voice.

"And you're always looking very handsome." It was particularly true tonight. He wore a button up shirt and khakis with nice loafers, practically white tie attire compared to what he usually wore. She would have to get him into a suit for the wedding. Wait, where had that come from? Yes, the corresponding names on their arms indicated they were soulmates, whatever that meant, but thinking about a wedding on the first date?

She dragged herself back to the real world, where Finnick had sat down across from her. Thank God she didn't have to ask him what he was studying or any of those other asinine small talk topics that were pretty much required of a first date. So, naturally, she went for the bad first date question. Having better options was always a way to ensure she'd take the worst one. "Have you been here before?"

"Nope, thought tonight'd be a chance to try something new."

Something new indeed. Or maybe something she'd tried before – who knew when it came to French names for food. Half of this stuff could be cheese and crackers for all she knew. _Le_ cheese and _le_ crackers, maybe, but functionally the same. "You know what any of this stuff is?"

He shook his head. "I took two years of French in school, but it's really not helping me right now."

"Can you at least tell me what's beef, what's chicken, and so on?"

"Probably?" The question in there wasn't comforting, but even an educated guess was better than she could muster.

With its glass chandelier and actual silver place settings, Le Deauville probably expected its customers to be on their best behavior. Annie stole over to Finnick's side of the table anyway, cozying up against his side and leaning her head on his shoulder. He smelled like cologne, and maybe something else as well. If her life was a novel, she would immediately be able to identify it as "All right, give me the rundown."

He kissed the top of her head. "Okay, well…" He pointed to an entry on the menu. "That's some kind of chicken and asparagus dish, while that's beef, mushrooms, and something else that I'm not sure of." He glanced up. "The waitress is coming back. You got any questions? She's probably a better person to ask than me." Annie didn't know enough about these dishes to even begin asking intelligent-sounding questions. She shifted in a little closer to combat the glare on the menu (as if that was somehow going to help), and he hissed.

Immediately, she froze. "I'm sorry! Are you all right?"

"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine. Just still a little sore from this morning."

There was a crash, and she spun towards the source. For a long, horrifying moment, Annie made eye contact with the wide-eyed, open-mouthed waitress, who had spilled some nice couple's soup all over the front of her starchy white clothes. "Oh, are you all right?" She grabbed a napkin – cloth, since this was one classy establishment- and stood up to help, but the waitress turned and practically ran away.

She felt Finnick's hand on her arm. "Come on, let's get out of here. I'll leave enough to cover your drinks and a nice tip."

"Wait, why? Oh…" Realization finally dawned. "She doesn't think –"

"She definitely thinks."

Annie didn't know that she'd ever laughed so hard on a first date. A few of the other patrons were watching them, but she leaned up to give him a kiss anyway. This was just, um, it was… it was _easy_ , that was the word she was looking for. And who cared if they had to give up their reservation at Le Deauville for somewhere cheaper? If it had grilled cheese, burgers, or just a couple hours spent together on the menu, Annie knew she'd be absolutely fine with it.


End file.
